Extreme Intelligence: Development, Predicaments, Implications

Extreme intelligence is strongly correlated with the highest of human achievement, but also, paradoxically, with higher relationship conflict, career difficulty, mental illness, and high-IQ crime. Increased intelligence does not necessarily increase success; it should be considered as a minority special need that requires nurturing.

This book explores the social development and predicaments of those who possess extreme intelligence, and the consequent personal and professional implications for them. It uniquely integrates insights and knowledge from the research fields of intelligence, giftedness, genius, and expertise with those from depth psychology, emphasising the importance of finding ways to talk effectively about extreme intelligence, and how it can better be supported and embraced. The author supports her arguments throughout, reviewing the academic literature alongside representations of genius in history, fiction, and the media, and draws on her own first-hand research interviews and consulting work with multinational high-IQ adults.

This book is essential reading for anyone supporting or working with the highly gifted, as well as those researching or interested by the field of intelligence.

Dr Sonja Falck is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Psychology, University of East London, UK. She is also a UKCP and BACP accredited psychotherapist and supervisor. She consults in person and online internationally, specialising in high-ability adults’ relationship issues. She has presented at SENG (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted), USA, and the British branch of the international high IQ society Mensa, UK.